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Canadian Government to Oppose Copyright Levy on MP3 Players
The Canadian federal government is rejecting a private member’s bill introduced by the New Democratic Party that seeks to extend the levy on blank tapes and CDs to include the current generation of storage medium. The bill would amend the private copying provisions under the Canadian Copyright Act so that the provisions relating to “blank audio-recording medium”, originally introduced in 1997, would also apply to mp3 players. The levy, which is used to compensate musicians, record companies and other stakeholders in the copyright for private copying, is imposed on manufacturers and importers and is passed on to retailers and ultimately to the consumer. The federal government is opposing the bill, stating that the bill as a tax on iPods and Blackberrys runs contrary to the goal of improving Canada’s digital economy. It remains to be seen how the federal government will deal with this issue in its own planned reform of the Copyright Act.
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